Warcraft III

Saturday must have been a very arduous day for Lyn. He played the greatest number of matches out of all the players in Paris as he was sent down to the lower bracket in his first match against Jae Ho 'Moon' Jang and fought all the way back up to the grand final.

I asked him almost exactly one year ago whether he was the world's best Orc player and he immediately got very shy, saying that of course he was not. But he has gone a long way in twelve months and the same question gets a different answer:

"I came home to Korea and practiced against high level Orc players. A lot of practice made the difference."

"I think there are several world class Orc players," he said, "and all are very good but they are different in that they have their own individual strengths against different races. Mine is against Undead because there are many good Undead players in Korea."

You could tell by his eyes and his smile, though, that the response was given more out of courtesy than out of shyness this time around.

Not so long ago, Lyn experienced big problems against Grubby in the WC3L finals, where he lost 2-0 and beat him 2-1 in another game. Asked what made the difference, he said:

"I came home to Korea and practiced against high level Orc players. A lot of practice made the difference." He still would not say that he was better than the Dutchman and obviously has a great deal of respect for him.

"Last year I thought it was 50-50 with us," he said and finished, smiling: "Now it is 51-49. The most difficult game of the day was not the one against Grubby. Lyn says that beating Xiaofeng 'Sky' Li was the hardest thing to do.

"Sky is so good against Orc and so is his special strategy against Orc."

"There are not so many good Human players in Korea," he explained, "and I cannot practice very well against Human. Sky is so good against Orc and so is his special strategy against Orc." In the final awaits another well-known Orc killer, Jae Ho 'Moon' Jang.

"He is so strong and his race is so strong," said Lyn with a smile that implied that it is hard for him to play Moon's Night Elves. "So maybe he will beat me again. But I have a chance because in WWI the maps are good for Orc. We will have to see."

It is going to be a difficult match, but if someone can manage to crawl back from the grave in a tournament, it is Lyn. Why wouldn't he do the same thing again?